Since Everyone seemes to have a misunterstanding of what is and isn't what I have been diagnosed with so far here you go. Lisa I think you have differnent symptoms or problems then I have, I can not be off my meds without flipping out, I also need time to build them back up in my boday after a 5 day swing. Yesterday all I could see as I was crying at the computer with my arms folded and my face to the floor was a slowed down world where talking, walking and everything slowed, all all I saw was visions of blood. I was definatly in a psychotic state becase 5 days of an anti psychotic will do that. Everyone thinks I should just go through life and be normal, sorry, I have changed in and since Iowa, alot in Iowa, Because I was so far from jimmy half the symptoms showed up, the other half were dormant from taking tons of LSD when everyone told me it would be "great for me to come home instead of being in columbus" All the drugs I ever did was in that period. And then depression I have had for life. So before you judge me. Read the 6 that I'm dealing with so far. Not saying I'm worse off thaN any one else just different.
Here Read my blog, once Jimmy leaves I'll update all I have let go through the summer, but you can go back and read.,
sutdog.blogspot.com
Bipolar II disorder
Definition
In the United States alone, bipolar disorder afflicts an estimated three million people. According to a report by the National Institutes of Mental Health, the disorder costs over $45 billion annually.
Bipolar, or manic-depressive, disorder is a mood disorder that causes radical emotional changes and mood swings, from manic highs to depressive lows. The majority of bipolar individuals experience alternating episodes of mania (an elevated or euphoric mood or irritable state) and depression.
Bipolar II disorder is characterized by major depressive episodes alternating with episodes of hypomania, a milder form of mania. Bipolar depression may be difficult to distinguish from unipolar depression (depression without mania, as found in major depressive disorder). Patients with bipolar depression tend to have extremely low energy, retarded mental and physical processes, and more profound fatigue(for example, hypersomnia—a sleep disorder marked by a need for excessive sleep or sleepiness when awake) than people with unipolar depression.
Anxiety Disorder
Definition
Anxiety is an unpleasant emotion triggered by anticipation of future events, memories of past events, or ruminations about the self.
Description
Stimulated by real or imagined dangers, anxiety afflicts people of all ages and social backgrounds. When the anxiety results from irrational fears, it can disrupt or disable normal life. Some researchers believe anxiety is synonymous with fear, occurring in varying degrees and in situations in which people feel threatened by some danger. Others describe anxiety as an unpleasant emotion caused by unidentifiable dangers or dangers that, in reality, pose no threat. Unlike fear, which is caused by realistic, known dangers, anxiety can be more difficult to identify and to alleviate.
Major depressive disorder
Definition
Major depressive disorder (MDD) is a condition characterized by a long-lasting depressed mood or marked loss of interest or pleasure (anhedonia) in all or nearly all activities. Children and adolescents with MDD may be irritable instead of sad. These symptoms, along with others described below, must be sufficiently severe to interfere significantly with the patient's daily functioning in order for a person to be diagnosed with MDD.
Description
Major depressive disorder is a serious mental disorder that profoundly affects an individual's quality of life. Unlike normal bereavement or an occasional episode of "the blues," MDD causes a lengthy period of gloom and hopelessness, and may rob the sufferer of the ability to take pleasure in activities or relationships that were previously enjoyable. In some cases, depressive episodes seem to be triggered by an obviously painful event, but MDD may also develop without a specific stressor. Research indicates that an initial episode of depression is likely to be a response to a specific stimulus, but later episodes are progressively more likely to start without a triggering event. A person suffering major depression finds jobrelated responsibilities and such other tasks as parenting burdensome and carried out only with great effort. Mental efficiency and memory are affected, causing even simple tasks to be tiring and irritating. Sexual interest dwindles; many people with MDD become withdrawn and avoid any type of social activity. Even the ability to enjoy a good meal or a sound night's sleep is frequently lost; many depressed people report a chronic sense of malaise (general discomfort or unease). For some, the pain and suffering accompanying MDD becomes so unendurable that suicide is viewed as the only option; MDD has the highest mortality rate of any mental disorder.
Disturbed mood (sad, hopeless, discouraged, "down in the dumps") during most of the day. Loss of interest or pleasure in activities. Change in appetite nearly every day, leading either to weight gain or to loss of 5% of body weight. In children, this symptom may appear as a failure to make normal weight gains related to growth. Insomnia(waking in the middle of the night and having difficulty returning to sleep, or waking too early in the morning) or hypersomnia(sleeping much more than normal). Psychomotor retardation (slowed thinking, speech, body movements) or agitation (inability to sit still, hand-wringing, pulling at clothing, skin, or other objects) that is apparent to others. Sense of worthlessness or unreasonable guilt over minor failings. Problems with clear thinking, concentration, and decision-making. Recurrent thoughts of death or suicide, or making a suicide attempt.
Agoraphobia
Definition
Agoraphobia is an anxiety disorder characterized by intense fear related to being in situations from which escape might be difficult or embarrassing (i.e., being on a bus or train), or in which help might not be available in the event of a panic attack or panic symptoms. Panic is defined as extreme and unreasonable fear and anxiety.
According to the handbook used by mental health professionals to diagnose mental disorders, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fourth edition, text revision, also known as the DSM-IV-TR, patients with agoraphobia are typically afraid of such symptoms as feeling dizzy, having an attack of diarrhea, fainting, or "going crazy."
The word "agoraphobia" comes from two Greek words that mean "fear" and "marketplace." The anxiety associated with agoraphobia leads to avoidance of situations that involve being outside one's home alone, being in crowds, being on a bridge, or traveling by car or public transportation. Agoraphobia may intensify to the point that it interferes with a person's ability to take a job outside the home or to carry out such ordinary errands and activities as picking up groceries or going out to a movie.
Description
The close association in agoraphobia between fear of being outside one's home and fear of having panic symptoms is reflected in DSM-IV-TR classification of two separate disorders: panic disorder (PD) with agoraphobia, and agoraphobia without PD. PD is essentially characterized by sudden attacks of fear and panic. There may be no known reason for the occurrence of panic attacks; they are frequently triggered by fear-producing events or thoughts, such as driving, or being in an elevator. PD is believed due to an abnormal activation of the body's hormonal system, causing a sudden "fight-or-flight" response.
The chief distinction between PD with agoraphobia and agoraphobia without PD is that patients who are diagnosed with PD with agoraphobia meet all criteria for PD; in agoraphobia without PD, patients are afraid of panic-like symptoms in public places, rather than full-blown panic attacks.
People with agoraphobia appear to suffer from two distinct types of anxiety— panic, and the anticipatory anxiety related to fear of future panic attacks. Patients with agoraphobia are sometimes able to endure being in the situations they fear by "gritting their teeth," or by having a friend or relative accompany them.
In the United States' diagnostic system, the symptoms of agoraphobia can be similar to those of specific phobia and social phobia. In agoraphobia and specific phobia, the focus is fear itself; with social phobia, the person's focus is on how others are perceiving him/her. Patients diagnosed with agoraphobia tend to be more afraid of their own internal physical sensations and similar cues than of the reactions of others per se. In cases of specific phobia, the person fears very specific situations, whereas in agoraphobia, the person generally fears a variety of situations (being outside of the home alone, or traveling on public transportation including a bus, train, or automobile, for example). An example of a patient diagnosed with a specific phobia rather than agoraphobia would be the person whose fear is triggered only by being in a bus, rather than a car or taxi. The fear of the bus is more specific than the agoraphobic's fear of traveling on public transportation in general. The DSM-IVTR remarks that the differential diagnosis of agoraphobia "can be difficult because all of these conditions are characterized by avoidance of specific situations."
Definition
Generalized anxiety disorder, or GAD, is a disorder characterized by diffuse and chronic worry. Unlike people with phobias or post-traumatic disorders, people with GAD do not have their worries provoked by specific triggers; they may worry about almost anything having to do with ordinary life. It is not unusual for patients diagnosed with GAD to shift the focus of their anxiety from one issue to another as their daily circumstances change. For example, someone with GAD may start worrying about finances when several bills arrive in the mail, and then fret about the state of his or her health when it is noticed that one of the bills is for health insurance. Later in the day he or she may read a newspaper article that moves the focus of the worry to a third concern.
A manual commonly used by mental health professionals is the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders,also known as the DSM.This manual may also be identified more specifically by edition, such as the DSM,fourth edition text revised, or DSM-IV-TR.The DSM-IV-TRclassifies GAD as an anxiety disorder.
Generalized anxiety disorder
Description
Generalized anxiety disorder is characterized by persistent worry that is excessive and that the patient finds hard to control. Common worries associated with generalized anxiety disorder include work responsibilities, money, health, safety, car repairs, and household chores. The ICD-10,which is the European equivalent of DSMIV-TR,describes the anxiety that typifies GAD as "free-floating," which means that it can attach itself to a wide number of issues or concerns in the patient's environment.
DSM-IV-TRspecifies that the worry must occur "more days than not for a period of at least six months"; ICD-10states only that the patient "must have primary symptoms of anxiety most days for at least several weeks at a time, and usually for several months." The patient usually recognizes that his or her worry is out of proportion in its duration or intensity to the actual likelihood or impact of the feared situation or event. For example, a husband or wife may worry about an accident happening to a spouse who commutes to work by train, even though the worried partner knows objectively that rail travel is much safer than automobile travel on major highways. The anxiety level of a patient with GAD may rise and fall somewhat over a period of weeks or months but tends to become a chronic problem. The disorder typically becomes worse during stressful periods in the patient's life.
Patients diagnosed with GAD have a high rate of concurrent mental disorders, particularly major depression disorder, other anxiety disorders, or a substance abuse disorder. They also frequently have or develop such stress-related physical illnesses and conditions as tension headaches, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), temporomandibular joint dysfunction (TMJ), bruxism (grinding of the teeth during sleep), and hypertension. In addition, the discomfort or complications associated with arthritis, diabetes, and other chronic disorders are often intensified by GAD. Patients with GAD are more likely to seek help from a primary care physician than a psychiatrist; they are also more likely than patients with other disorders to make frequent medical appointments, to undergo extensive or repeated diagnostic testing, to describe their health as poor, and to smoke tobacco or abuse other substances. In addition, patients with anxiety disorders have higher rates of mortality from all causes than people who are less anxious.
In many cases, it is difficult for the patient's doctor to determine whether the anxiety preceded the physical condition or followed it; sometimes people develop generalized anxiety disorder after being diagnosed with a chronic organic health problem. In other instances, the wear and tear on the body caused by persistent and recurrent worrying leads to physical diseases and disorders. There is an overall "vicious circle" quality to the relationship between GAD and other disorders, whether mental or organic.
Children diagnosed with GAD have much the same anxiety symptoms as adults. The mother of a six-year-old boy with the disorder told his pediatrician that her son "acted like a little man" rather than a typical first-grader. He would worry about such matters as arriving on time for school field trips, whether the family had enough money for immediate needs, whether his friends would get hurt climbing on the playground jungle gym, whether there was enough gas in the tank of the family car, and similar concerns. The little boy had these worries in spite of the fact that his family was stable and happy and had no serious financial or other problems.
GAD often has an insidious onset that begins relatively early in life, although it can be precipitated by a sudden crisis at any age above six or seven years. The idea that GAD often begins in the childhood years even though the symptoms may not become clearly noticeable until late adolescence or the early adult years is gaining acceptance. About half of all patients diagnosed with the disorder report that their worrying began in childhood or their teenage years. Many will say that they cannot remember a time in their lives when they were not worried about something. This type of persistent anxiety can be regarded as part of a person's temperament, or inborn disposition; it is sometimes called trait anxiety. It is not unusual, however, for people to develop the disorder in their early adult years or even later in reaction to chronic stress or anxiety-producing situations. For example, there are instances of persons developing GAD after several years of taking care of a relative with dementia, living with domestic violence, or living in close contact with a friend or relative with borderline personality disorder.
The specific worries of a person with GAD may be influenced by their ethnic background or culture. DSMIV-TR'sobservation that being punctual is a common concern of patients with GAD reflects the value that Western countries place on using time as efficiently as possible. One study of worry in college students from different ethnic backgrounds found that Caucasian and African American students tended to worry a variable amount about a wider range of concerns whereas Asian Americans tended to worry more intensely about a smaller number of issues. Another study found that GAD in a community sample of older Puerto Ricans overlapped with a culture-specific syndrome called ataque de nervios, which resembles panic disorder but has features of other anxiety disorders as well as dissociative symptoms. (People experience dissociative symptoms when their perception of reality is temporarily altered— they may feel as if they were in a trance, or that they were observing activity around them instead of participating.) Further research is needed regarding the relationship between people's ethnic backgrounds and their outward expression of anxiety symptoms.
Definition
Brief psychotic disorder is a short-term, time-limited disorder. An individual with brief psychotic disorder has experienced at least one of the major symptoms of psychosis for less than one month. Hallucinations, delusions, strange bodily movements or lack of movements (catatonic behavior), peculiar speech and bizarre or markedly inappropriate behavior are all classic psychotic symptoms that may occur in brief psychotic disorder.
The cause of the symptoms helps to determine whether or not the sufferer is described as having brief psychotic disorder. If the psychotic symptoms appear as a result of a physical disease, a reaction to medication, or intoxication with drugs or alcohol, then the unusual behaviors are not classified as brief psychotic disorder. If hallucinations, delusions, or other psychotic symptoms occur at the same time that an individual is experiencing major clinical depression or bipolar (manic-depressive) disorder, then the brief psychotic disorder diagnosis is not given. The decision rules that allow the clinician to identify this cluster of symptoms as brief psychotic disorder are outlined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders Fourth Edition Text Revision, produced by the American Psychiatric Association. This manual is referred to by most mental health professionals as DSM-IV-TR.
Brief psychotic disorder
Description
Positive symptoms
The person experiencing brief psychotic disorder always has one or more "positive" psychotic symptoms. The psychotic symptoms are not "positive" in the everyday sense of something being good or useful. Positive in this context is used with the medical meaning: a factor is present that is not normally expected, or a normal type of behavior is experienced in its most extreme form. Positive symptoms of psychosis include hallucinations, delusions, strange bodily movements or lack of movements (catatonic behavior), peculiar speech and bizarre or primitive behavior.
HALLUCINATIONS. Hallucinations involve experiencing sensations that have no corresponding objective reality. Hallucinations can occur in various forms that parallel the human senses. Visual hallucinations involve the sense of sight, or "seeing things." Auditory hallucinations generally involve hearing voices, and are the most common of the hallucinations. Sometimes, a hallucination can include both voices and some visual experience; mental health professionals describe this as an "auditory-visual hallucination." Smelling non-existent smells or feeling things on or under one's skin that do not actually exist are forms of somatic hallucinations. Somatic comes from soma, the Greek word for body; thus, somatic hallucinations are bodily hallucinations.
DELUSIONS. Delusions are also a classic psychotic feature. Delusions are strongly held irrational and unrealistic beliefs that are extremely difficult to change, even when the person is exposed to evidence that contradicts the delusion. The layperson typically thinks of delusions as being "paranoid," or "persecutory" wherein the delusional person is excessively suspicious and continually feels at the mercy of conspirators who are "out to get" him or her. However, delusions can also be unjustified beliefs that are grandiose, involve elaborate love fantasies ("erotomanic" delusions), or extreme and irrational jealousy. Grandiose delusions are persistent irrational beliefs that somehow exaggerate the person's importance, such as believing oneself to be a famous person, or having an enviable position such as being the Prime Minister or President. Often grandiose delusions take on religious overtones; for instance, a person might become convinced that she is the Virgin Mary. Furthermore, delusions can be somatic. Somatic delusions are erroneous but strongly held beliefs about the characteristics or functioning of one's body; an example is a mental health consumer who refuses to eat because of a conviction that the throat muscles are completely paralyzed and that only liquids can be swallowed, when there is no actual physical reason to be unable to swallow.
OTHER PSYCHOTIC SYMPTOMS. Other psychotic symptoms that may occur in brief psychotic disorder are strange bodily movements or lack of movements (catatonic behavior), peculiar speech, and bizarre or child-like behavior. Catatonic behavior or catatonia involves both possible extremes related to movement. Catalepsy is the motionless aspect of catatonia—a person with catalepsy may remain fixed in the same position for hours on end. Rapid or persistently repeated movements, frequent grimacing and strange facial expressions, and unusual gestures are the opposite end of the catatonia phenomenon. Peculiar speech is also seen in some cases of brief psychotic disorder. Speech distortions can involve words mixed together in no coherent order, responses that are irrelevant and strange in the context of the conversation in which they occur, or echolalia, the repetition of another person's exact spoken words, repeated either immediately after the speaker or after a delay of minutes to hours. Bizarre behavior can range from child-like behaviors such as skipping, singing, or hopping in inappropriate circumstances to unusual practices such as hoarding food or covering one's head and clothing with aluminum foil wrappings.
Next Time Just Leave me Alone.
